Curry Barker’s horror breakout, Obsession, opened to an impressive estimated $15 million this weekend for Focus Features, immediately opening the door for a potential sequel, especially if the movie performs well on streaming and in ancillary markets. It most likely will.
Obsession feels like the kind of movie that’s accessible, sticky, and built to stand the test of time.
For those who have seen the film — and minor spoilers ahead for those who haven’t — the movie contains what Barker himself considers a bit of a plot hole. In a new interview with Total Film, the filmmaker admitted that the concept behind the “One Wish Willow” creates an inherent paradox.
The film follows Bear, played by Michael Johnston, who uses a supernatural item called the “One Wish Willow” to wish for his longtime crush Nikki, played by Inde Navarrette, to love him more than anyone else in the world. The wish works, but the result becomes horrifyingly obsessive and violent.
According to Barker, the problem with the concept is simple: if this supernatural object exists and grants wishes, why isn’t the rest of the world descending into complete chaos from everybody else making wishes too? The movie lightly alludes to the idea that the world outside Bear’s experience is otherwise normal, creating a paradox that even Barker admits bothers him.
Still, he says he ultimately chose to ignore it.
“I mean, it’s kind of a plot hole. It’s something I don’t like to think about too much, because it totally doesn’t make sense that there’s a world of people just making wishes,” he told Total Film after a recent screening. “It really doesn’t make any sense at all.”
“If the One Wish Willow actually works, which it does in this lore, and people are just making wishes left and right, there would be some crazy—like, dragons would exist. And none of that. The world is pretty normal from what we see in this movie. So, it doesn’t really make sense.”
“Here’s my take; every time someone makes a wish, they enter into an alternate reality where their wish comes true, so you’re not experiencing everybody’s wish at the same time. And that’s why—but that doesn’t make sense because the money falls from the ceiling. Yeah, it’s broken,” he conceded, referencing a scene in which Bear’s friend Ian (Cooper Tomlinson) wishes for a large sum right in front of him.
The self-awareness and honesty here are part of what makes Curry Barker such an exciting new voice in horror.
That conversation led Barker into discussing a potential sequel, where he expanded on the idea of turning Obsession into some kind of anthology series. Instead of following Bear and Nikki again, each story could revolve around a different person making a different wish and suffering through their own twisted consequences.
“I obviously have a couple more things that I’m excited about next, but I do see Obsession 2, maybe. Or even what really is exciting to me is maybe an anthology, like a one-hour episode,” said Barker. “Each episode is a different wish that goes completely off the rails. Maybe I’ll direct the pilot with the same DP, and you could invite other filmmakers to kind of give their spin at it. That would be really cool.”
If you’ve seen the movie, you immediately understand why that idea works.
The concept opens up the entire world of Obsession and essentially turns it into a modern supernatural sandbox built around The Monkey’s Paw, one of the greatest horror concepts ever created. You could explore hundreds of different wishes, different people, different emotional weaknesses, and all of the horrifying fallout that comes with them.
What makes the idea even more exciting is that Obsession heavily implies there’s something bigger behind the “One Wish Willow” itself — whether that’s Satan, a demon, the Devil, or some unknown evil force putting these cursed wishes into the world.
The film never fully explains it, but the implication is there.
Oddly enough, Rick and Morty already played with a very similar concept in the episode “Something Ricked This Way Comes,” where cursed objects are sold through a demonic shop and every item comes with horrifying consequences attached. The episode leaned comedic, but the core idea is almost identical to what Barker is exploring here: human desire mixed with supernatural punishment.
That’s why an Obsession anthology series could be phenomenal.
Instead of repeating the same story, each installment could become its own contained nightmare about greed, loneliness, jealousy, love, vanity, obsession, or regret, all filtered through one terrible wish that spirals out of control. And considering how well Barker blends horror with dark comedy and emotional discomfort, it feels like a concept that could genuinely run for years.
Thanks to Deadline for the transcription.
https://ift.tt/0sQmwdt https://ift.tt/sNx1vi4Obsession director Curry Barker would like to explore more deadly wishes in the future perhaps in a potential anthology series #Obsession pic.twitter.com/JLKCkpyTch
— Total Film (@totalfilm) May 16, 2026
No comments:
Post a Comment